Hello and welcome to Overthink.

The podcast where two philosophers help you think through your own complicated experience

in relation to big ideas.

I'm Ellie Anderson.

And I'm David Pena Guzman.

Ellie, as you know, I love playing tennis.

And I wanted to begin today's episode by mentioning Naomi Osaka, who is a black Japanese tennis player,

who has become a very well-known figure in the world of tennis,

of course. But also outside of it, she had her own sweet green bowl a couple of years ago,

I remember. Well, and she's been also in the news for political reasons because she's also been

politically engaged, which is not typical for athletes. But the reason that I wanted to mention her today is because Naomi Osaka is a black and

Japanese player.

So she is a biracial.

She identifies as a biracial person.

And she has faced a lot of discrimination and obstacles in the world of athletics,

precisely for that reason.

She talks about, for example, how many reporters after a tennis match will insist on asking her whether she deep down feels more black or Japanese, which is not, A, related to sports,

and B, is not a question that any biracial person can answer one way or the other.

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

I also think it's telling, as you're describing this, that her identities as black and Japanese are what get focused on, because that's a sort of odd mismatch.

They're not asking her.

Her dad is Haitian-American, I'm seeing. They're not asking her if she feels Haitian, American. I'm seeing they're not asking her if she feels

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